Jan 19, 2007

Broken gas pumps, late planes and trial advocacy

-We have our shower back and the wall looks fine, now all we need is better water pressure.

-This week I had to give an opening statement in my trial advocacy class. It made me nervous, but apparently a lot of my nerves were not recognized as such to my audience of mock-jurors/classmates.

-Last weekend, Elana and I visited my sister Julie and her younger children. It was a surprise for the children and we had a good time. I wish they lived closer. Apparently, we brought the good weather with us. After we left, the temperature dropped 35 degrees and it snowed. The plane ride home was stressful. First our original flight was delayed on account of our plane being trapped in an ice storm a thousand miles away (it never arrived at our airport to pick us up) and we missed our connector flight...the new connector flight was then delayed for 2 hours. We arrived so late that we had to take a cab. Our ride from the airport (Mom) was already asleep when we made it back to L.A.

-Last night, I had a frustrating and annoying episode. I was pumping gas into our hybrid when I realized that the pump said that I had pumped 14.156 gallons of gas. This is not supposed to be possible. My car's tank (according to the manual) has a capacity of 13.2 gallons. Based on my mileage calculations, I still had about 2 gallons left in the tank when I started pumping anyway. (i.e. the little red light had not yet lit up) So doing the math, 14.156 + ~2 gallons = 16.156 gallons. Apparently a miracle has occurred and my gas tank has expanded. I checked to make sure the tank was not over flowing--it was not. I stopped the pump and went to the cashier. He was confused and didn't have an answer. He called over the other guy who was there, but all the other one could say is that the owner-manager would be there the next day. Realizing that these guys has no authority and that I was unlikely to get the few bucks I was being overcharged back, I resolved to blog about it and ask if anyone knows who to call to get their pumps inspected. So, anyone know?

FYI, it was a Chevron station at Vanowen and Fallbrook in Woodland Hills, pump #4.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Call Los Angeles County Department of Weights and Measures, give them the details. They should go out and test the pumps, though by the time they get there the manager will probably have reset it. This happens more often than you think.

Anonymous (AKA PapaGatta)

Adiv said...

Thanks!

Actually, I found the website at http://acwm.co.la.ca.us/scripts/gasform.cfm.

I filed a complaint and the automated response said that they would investigate.

meish said...

I've heard about that problem with the gas pumps! Very suspicious...

Oh, and I was super nervous throughout my entire Trial Ad semester - good luck!